Hold Congress Accountable

Knowledge is power. It makes sure people understand what is happening to their country, and how they can make a difference. FreedomWorks University will give you the tools to understand economics, the workings of government, the history of the American legal system, and the most important debates facing our nation today. Enroll in FreedomWorks University today!

Blog

As Promised - Team Obama Kills Another 750 Coal Jobs in VA, KY and WV

"Under my plan of a cap and trade system electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket. Businesses would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money. They will pass that cost onto consumers."

He promised that his plan would cause electricity rates to skyrocket.

For some odd reason, Barack Obama believed this would be good for the economy.

Now thanks to Barack Obama's radical energy policies, electricity rates are skyrocketing across the country and coal plants are shutting their doors. New regulations by the Obama Administration is forcing Arch Coal, Inc. to lay off 750 workers in Kentucky, West Virginia and Virginia.FOX News reported:

One of the world's largest coal producers said Thursday it would lay off about 750 workers in the Kentucky, Virginia and West Virginia coalfields, the latest setback for an industry struggling to sustain market share as utilities switch to cleaner and cheaper alternatives to generate electricity.

The bulk of the cuts by Arch Coal Inc., almost 600, are in Kentucky. The disappearance of high-paying mining work heightened anxiety in hardscrabble Kentucky towns where officials worried declining demand for coal would result in leaner budgets and more people on unemployment rolls.

"This is just a start, I think," said Dennis Ray Noble, the judge-executive of Perry County, which he estimated has lost about 30 percent of its mining jobs in the last year and the jobless rate is 12.4 percent.

The St. Louis-based company said its subsidiaries would close three higher-cost mining complexes and associated preparation plants: two in Kentucky and one in West Virginia. It will temporarily idle another complex in Kentucky and curtail production at other facilities in the three states. The company accounted for 16 percent of the coal production in the U.S. in 2010.

The layoffs come amid forecasts that the share of U.S. electricity coming from coal will fall below 40 percent for the year — the lowest level since the government began collecting data in 1949. Four years ago, it was 50 percent. By the end of this decade, it is likely to be near 30 percent.

Two well-known Washington insiders -- Erskine Bowles, a former White House chief of staff under Bill Clinton, and Alan Simpson, a retired Republican Senator -- have issued a press release updating their famous deficit-reduction plan.

In Tuesday's State of the Union Address, President Obama proposed raising the federally mandated minimum wage to $9 per hour, a 24% increase over the current mandate. In a subsequent conversation, my friend David Guenther of the Texas Public Policy Foundation made a good point about the effects of this if it were to come to pass:

It is a strange sign of the world in which we live that politicians are compared to Jesus Christ himself. It’s interesting, however, to look at the reactions to these bizarre proclamations. Let’s take a look at Barack Obama and Marco Rubio, for example. Both have been called a savior recently, but the reactions from the men were markedly different.

So much for a mandate. As President Obama heads into his celebrated, historic and transformational second term, the American people are distinctly distrustful of the government over which he presides.For the first time ever, a majority of the public says that the federal government threatens their personal rights and freedoms. The Pew Research Center found that 53 percent of Americans view the feds as a threat while only 43 percent disagree.

“I, Barack Obama, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States, do hereby proclaim January 16, 2013, as Religious Freedom Day.”

When President Obama came to office, he promised that government would solve all kinds of problems. The economy would boom, war would end, and the scourge of crabgrass would never again despoil suburban lawns.Progressive believers never doubted that Washington could merely snap its fingers and the infinitely complex global economy would snap to attention. Even the ocean levels would obey President Canute.

Key Vote NO on H.R. 8, the “Fiscal Cliff” Tax Hikes and Sequester Postponement Bill
Dear FreedomWorks member,
As one of our millions of FreedomWorks members nationwide, I urge you to contact your U.S. Representative and urge him or her to vote against H.R. 8, the McConnell-Obama bill to raise taxes and postpone the promised sequester savings.